1 of 3. Protesters take part in a demonstration in Ramadi, 100 km (62 miles) west of Baghdad, December 26, 2012.

ANBAR, Iraq | Wed Dec 26, 2012 11:46am EST

ANBAR, Iraq (Reuters) - Tens of thousands of Sunni Muslims blocked Iraq's main trade route to neighboring Syria and Jordan in a fourth day of demonstrations on Wednesday against Shi'ite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki.

The massive show of force marks an escalation in protests that erupted last week after troops detained the bodyguards of Sunni Finance Minister Rafaie Esawi, threatening to plunge Iraq deeper into political turmoil.

"The people want to bring down the regime," chanted thousands of protesters in the Sunni stronghold of Anbar, echoing the slogan used in popular revolts that ended in the toppling of the leaders of Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Yemen.

Waving the old flag of Iraq that was changed after Sunni dictator Saddam Hussein was overthrown by the U.S.-led invasion of 2003, protesters sat in the road, choking off the main trade route between Iraq, Jordan and Syria.

Another smaller protest was held in the city of Samarra in the predominantly Sunni province of Salahuddin, next to Anbar.

The move against Esawi's guards came hours after President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd who has mediated among Sunni, Shi'ite and Kurdish factions, left for Germany for treatment for a stroke that could end his steadying influence over Iraqi politics.

The arrest was reminiscent of Maliki's move to arrest Sunni Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi, who he accused of running death squads, just as U.S. troops withdrew in December 2011.

Iraq's fragile power-sharing government has since lurched from crisis to crisis and the conflict in Syria risks reigniting sectarian tensions that brought the country to the brink of all-out civil war in 2005-2007.

Addressing the protesters, Esawi said the detention of his guards was politically motivated and that Maliki was deliberately provoking strife.

"It is enough! The country should not be run by such a mentality," he said, to cries of "God is greatest".

Maliki has sought to play his rivals off against one another to strengthen his alliances in Iraq's complex political landscape before provincial elections next year and a parliamentary vote in 2014.

Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, another rival of Maliki, offered his support to the protests in a statement, rejecting what he described as Maliki's sectarian policies.

(Additional reporting by Ahmed Rasheed in Baghdad; Writing by Isabel Coles; Editing by Jon Hemming)

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Russian President Vladimir Putin looks on during a joint news conference with European Council President Herman Van Rompuy and European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso (unseen) following a European Union-Russia summit in Brussels December 21, 2012.

MOSCOW | Sun Dec 23, 2012 7:05pm EST

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Arms sales will be on the agenda when Russian President Vladimir Putin visits India on Monday to court a country that has traditionally been a top client.

Putin's trip, his first to India since he started a new Kremlin six-year term in May, is a chance to reaffirm Russia's interest in India, long a regional ally and now a partner in the BRICS group of emerging market nations.

In an article for publication in the Indian newspaper The Hindu on Monday, Putin stressed that "deepening friendship and cooperation with India is among the top priorities of our foreign policy".

"India and Russia show an example of responsible leadership and collective actions in the international arena," he wrote, a veiled swipe at the West and in particular the United States, whom Putin accuses of seeking to impose its will on the world.

Russian defense industry sources said the visit could produce deals on the sale of fighter jets and aircraft engines worth more than $7.5 billion. One said that could include the sale of 42 Sukhoi Su-30MKI fighters and a deal on the long-term supply of 970 warplane engines.

The Kremlin said it expected the signing of "a number of large contracts in the area of military-technical cooperation", a term referring to weapons sales, licensing and servicing.

However, warm ties dating back to the Soviet era have been complicated by recent Russian efforts to improve relations with Pakistan, one of Moscow's proxy enemies during the Soviet Union's war of occupation in Afghanistan in the 1980s.

Relations between the world's second biggest arms exporter Russia and India, its largest buyer last year, have also run into sporadic problems including delays in the delivery of a reconditioned Soviet-built aircraft carrier, now expected late in 2013.

MILITARY MIGHT

India plans to spend about $100 billion over the next 10 years to upgrade its largely Soviet-era military equipment, as Asia's third largest economy looks to match its economic might with military power and warily eyes assertive Asian rival China.

Moscow has warm political ties with China, another ally in opposing U.S. clout and a key consumer of the oil and gas that drives Russia's economy, but is thought to also be wary of a faster-growing neighbor with nearly 10 times its population.

India relies on Russia for 60 percent of its arms purchases, but has diversified its suppliers in recent years.

Putin announced record arms sales this year but wants to minimize the effect of the loss of deals with Libya and of uncertainty about the future of longtime client Syria on Russia's defense industry, an important source of political support for him.

Putin, whose country took up the presidency of the G20 this month, also hopes for strong growth in overall trade with India.

In his article, he said the volume of bilateral trade with India was expected to reach a record $10 billion this year, after declining due to the global financial crisis, and set a target of doubling that to $20 billion by 2015.

For Putin, who will meet Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, President Pranab Mukherjee and senior lawmakers, India is the most distant destination since rumors of a back problem emerged after he was seen limping in September.

He had originally been expected to travel to India last month but the Kremlin has dismissed suggestions he has serious health problems, and Putin implied last week that such talk was politically motivated.

(Writing by Steve Gutterman; Editing by Andrew Osborn)

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Piles of clothes are seen alongside sewing machines in the Tazreen Fashions garment factory, where 112 workers died in a devastating fire last month, in Savar November 30, 2012.

WASHINGTON | Thu Dec 20, 2012 9:04pm EST

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A dozen U.S. lawmakers pressed President Barack Obama's administration on Thursday to complete a long-running review that could lead to suspension of trade benefits for Bangladesh after a deadly factory blaze there last month.

"We are seriously concerned about the deterioration of working conditions and worker rights in Bangladesh," the congressional Democrats said in a letter to U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk.

"The latest apparel industry fire, with over 100 workers killed, in the Tazreen garment factory is the latest in a series of events and practices constituting this decline," the lawmakers said.

A Bangladeshi panel investigating the November 24 fire at the Tazreen Fashion Factory that killed 112 workers concluded it was the result of both sabotage and negligence.

A U.S. trade official said Kirk's office had been concerned about the worker-rights situation in Bangladesh for some time and had conveyed those concerns to the Bangladeshi government on numerous occasions.

The Tazreen fire had "intensified our concerns," the official said.

"USTR takes the rights and conditions of workers very seriously and we are carefully reviewing this situation to determine next steps, including with respect to an ongoing review of worker rights in Bangladesh under the Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) program," the official said.

The Tazreen tragedy put a spotlight on global retailers that source clothes from Bangladesh, where labor costs are as little as $37 a month for some workers. Human rights groups have called on big-brand firms to sign up a fire-safety program.

The largest U.S. labor organization, the AFL-CIO federation, has raised concerns for years about working conditions in Bangladesh and filed a petition in 2007 asking for a review of trade benefits for the country under the GSP program, which waives U.S. import duties for poor countries on thousands of goods.

GSP rules require a country to demonstrate that it is "taking steps to afford internationally recognized human rights," the U.S. lawmakers said. "We believe it is vital that your office complete your assessment of Bangladesh's compliance with these requirements."

(Reporting By Doug Palmer; Editing by David Brunnstrom)

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WASHINGTON | Thu Dec 20, 2012 7:41am EST

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Western states that rely on receipts from coal sales to help fund their governments are concerned the mining industry is dodging royalty payments on lucrative U.S. exports to Asia.

By valuing coal at low domestic prices rather than the much higher price fetched overseas, coal producers can skip a large royalty payout when mining federal land.

The practice could add up to hundreds of millions of dollars in forgone royalties if exports to Asia surge in coming years as the industry hopes, Reuters found.

Wyoming warned federal officials about flaws in the royalty system a year and a half ago. Last week Montana Governor Brian Schweitzer said he will not tolerate the coal industry skirting royalties: "If there's phony baloney going on, we have to get to the bottom of it."

Montana and Wyoming get half of federal royalties on coal from their states.

Asian energy demands mean several million tons of the black rock typically move from the Powder River Basin in eastern Wyoming and Montana across the Pacific each year. Taxpayers have a stake in those sales since the region is mostly on public land.

Powder River Basin sales are uncommonly profitable for miners like Arch Coal, Peabody Energy Corp. and Cloud Peak Energy since coal worth about $13 a ton last year domestically could have fetched roughly 10 times that in China.

Last year less than 5 percent of Cloud Peak coal was shipped to Asia but that accounted for nearly 19 percent of revenue, or about $290 million.

Federal and state officials have said that the mining industry is two steps ahead of regulation as it moves into Asian markets and that the current rules that value coal are open to abuse.

Questions about royalties and taxpayer interests could flavor a dispute about whether coal export terminals should be built in the Pacific Northwest.

Activists in Oregon and Washington have vowed to block coal trains that the mining industry hopes will link the Powder River Basin and Asian markets. Coal export foes say local communities will be harmed by mile-long coal train traffic, and scientists warn that coal power is worsening the impacts of climate change.

VAGARIES OF ROYALTIES

Officials expect coal royalties to be paid on the highest value for the fuel, which is typically the price utilities are willing to pay.

But regulators fret that miners are selling to sister companies at low domestic prices and then pocketing gains when that coal eventually reaches Asian power plants, thus circumventing the higher royalty.

Arch Coal, Cloud Peak and Peabody Energy declined to comment on how they book Asian sales, but they boast to investors about their profitable trade and brokering business.

That business is booming.

About 54 percent of coal export sales from the Powder River Basin was handled by brokers last year while only about 16 percent of such sales east of the Mississippi River was handled that way, according to the Energy Information Administration.

The Office of Natural Resources Revenue, an agency of the Interior Department, has struggled to find the true value of coal when brokered deals and direct-to-utility sales produce different prices for the fuel.

The agency's benchmarks for finding the true value of coal "have proven difficult to use in practice," the agency wrote in May 2011 as it mulled royalty rules that it said were open to abuse.

In a letter supporting tougher rules, the Wyoming Department of Audit beseeched ONRR to "not allow coal producers to create affiliates to reduce the royalties paid."

The mining industry, though, defended the status quo in several letters to regulators.

An ONRR spokesman said officials were committed to collecting every dollar due taxpayers, but he could not comment on when final royalty valuation rules might be proposed.

Autumn Hanna with nonpartisan Taxpayers for Common Sense said the government must quickly put rules in place to protect the public interest on coal sales.

"Taxpayers stand to lose day by day with the existing rules," she said. "The new rules are needed now."

FUTURE EXPORTS

The coal trade has become a controversial issue in the Pacific Northwest where miners want new terminals to allow about 150 million tons of coal a year to be exported from the Powder River Basin.

While politicians spar over whether those ports should be built, there is less friction about what taxpayers are due.

"The Department of the Interior should ensure these companies pay royalties on the full value," said Oregon Senator Ron Wyden, whose staff has met with federal officials in recent weeks to discuss the issues raised by Reuters reporting.

Wyden, a Democrat, will chair the Energy and Natural Resources Committee in the next Congress.

Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski, the ranking Republican on that committee, believes the government should allow coal exports but officials must protect taxpayers' stake in such sales.

"We know Interior is looking at this and we wait to hear what they find," said a Murkowski spokesman, who noted the senator believes Congress should be setting rules on royalty payments.

Montana Governor Schweitzer, who leaves office next month, has roundly supported the coal terminal expansion, but the straight-talking rancher and miner said taxpayers must get a fair cut on those Asian sales.

"We need to collect on the actual value," Schweitzer told Reuters in an interview.

(Reporting by Patrick Rucker; editing by Prudence Crowther)

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A man grabs his briefcase as he waits in line to speak with employers at the UJA-Federation Connect to Care job fair in New York, March 21, 2012.

WASHINGTON | Thu Aug 9, 2012 4:52pm EDT

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The number of Americans filing new claims for jobless benefits unexpectedly fell last week, offering hope that some of last month's improvement in job growth could be sustained and give the U.S. economy a lift.

Other data on Thursday was also positive with the international trade deficit in June the smallest in 1-1/2 years as the petroleum import bill dropped sharply.

While the smaller trade gap implied upward revisions to the government's estimate of second-quarter gross domestic product published last month, the impact was blunted somewhat by an unexpected drop in wholesale stocks in June.

Initial claims for state unemployment benefits slipped 6,000 to a seasonally adjusted 361,000, the Labor Department said. Economists had expected claims to rise to 370,000 last week.

The data came after a Labor Department report last week showed that in July employers hired the most workers in five months.

"The fact that initial jobless claims have fallen back to their March lows suggests faster employment gains will continue to support consumer spending in the coming months," said Harm Bandholz, chief U.S. economist at UniCredit Research in New York.

U.S. nonfarm payrolls increased 163,000 in July after three months of gains below 100,000. But the unemployment rate rose by a tenth of a percentage point to 8.3 percent.

Last week's jobless benefit claims report was the first in several weeks not affected by auto plant shutdowns, which caused wide swings in claims in July, making it difficult to get a clean reading on the jobs market.

A second report from the Commerce Department on Thursday showed the shortfall on the trade balance narrowed 10.7 percent to $42.9 billion, the smallest since December 2010, as low oil prices curbed imports.

That was below economists' expectations for a $47.5 billion deficit. The oil import bill fell $2.2 billion to 32.9 billion, the lowest since February. That was as the average price per barrel of crude oil dropped by the most since January 2009.

The reports helped the Standard & Poor's 500 stock index eke out a small gain and extend its rally for a fifth day on the New York stock market. Prices for U.S. government debt edged down, while the dollar rose broadly.

EXPORTS HIT RECORD HIGH

Immediately after the trade report, economists forecast the initial second-quarter U.S. GDP growth estimate would be revised to as high as 2.2 percent, but tempered those predictions after a later report showed a decline in wholesale inventories in June.

Second-quarter growth is now seen revised up to an annual pace of at least 1.8 percent from 1.5 percent. The government will publish its second GDP estimate later this month.

Total wholesale inventories slipped 0.2 percent, the largest fall since September, after being flat in May, as the value of petroleum stocks tumbled 8.7 percent - the largest drop since October 2008.

Inventory changes are a key component of GDP and contributed about a third of a percentage point to growth in the second quarter. Trade cut almost a third of a percentage point from GDP growth.

Exports in June increased 0.9 percent to a record $185.0 billion, with consumer goods such as pharmaceuticals posting strong gains. Motor vehicle exports increased 5.7 percent.

Overall imports of goods and services declined 1.5 percent to $227.9 billion. Outside petroleum, there were decreases in consumer goods imports, underscoring the weak domestic demand. The country imported less food and capital goods in June.

However, industrial supplies and motor vehicle imports rose.

"As long as we can keep selling more of our goods across the world, the economy can grow at a moderate pace," said Joel Naroff, chief economist at Naroff Economic Advisors in Holland, Pennsylvania.

"Despite all the craziness in Europe and the slowdowns in Asia, our exports managed to increase. We shipped more of just about everything except food."

While exports showed strength in June, anecdotal evidence suggests a slowdown because of weak global demand. The Institute for Supply Management's export index declined in July for a third straight month.

There also are concerns that the worst U.S. drought since 1956, which has ravaged half of the country, could hit agricultural exports.

U.S. exports to the 27-nation European Union, in the grip of a continuing debt crisis that has slowed growth on the continent, increased 1.7 percent in June to $23.3 billion.

Exports to China, which is also growing more slowly than in recent years, fell 4.3 percent in June. Economists believed the drop in imports would be temporary, especially with the labor market improvement expected to lift consumer spending.

"A stronger labor market implies better consumer spending ahead, which will certainly lead to more robust trade figures," said Omair Sharif, an economist at RBS in Stamford, Connecticut.

"We will end up importing more and get the deficit widening. But that's not necessarily a bad thing."

(Lucia.Mutikani@thomsonreuters.com)

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